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Sir David Murray goes green with ‘eco-village’ plan

June 24 2010

Sir David Murray goes green with ‘eco-village’ plan
Rangers’ owner Sir David Murray has launched a billion pound plan to build a Garden District on the western fringe of Edinburgh.

A 3,500 home community would be centred on Scotland’s National garden centre, the ‘Calyx’, a showcase for sustainable gardening methods for residents and visitors.

This is intended to encourage residents to grow their own fruit and vegetables in gardens and allotments and every person would be within no more than a five minute walk to the nearest bus or tram stop.

It could be something of a misnomer though as the development would actually be built on existing green belt land, thus exacerbating suburban pressure on the city.

Should approval be forthcoming from Edinburgh City Council work could commence on site by 2014 and be completed by 2030.

Local SNP councillor Norman Work is sceptical of the plans however, dubbing it: “a housing scheme with a glorified garden centre.”

7 Comments

richard
#1 Posted by richard on 24 Jun 2010 at 13:19 PM
Anyone know if there's a master plan, design statement or supporting document for this proposal yet?
John Glenday
#2 Posted by John Glenday on 24 Jun 2010 at 15:36 PM
Oodles more detail here
http://www.edinburghsgardendistrict.co.uk
Monkey9000
#3 Posted by Monkey9000 on 24 Jun 2010 at 23:24 PM
Shouldn't the owner of a Glasgow based institution be investing in said city? Perhaps some of the brownfield around Ibrox would be a good place to start...
Chimp
#4 Posted by Chimp on 25 Jun 2010 at 10:02 AM
Isn't ownership of said Glasgow institution an investment itself? Perhaps he should vacate his Charlotte Square offices too...

I love it when Green Belt is built on, and the RBS HQ started the ball rolling on that side of the bypass.
Geoff
#5 Posted by Geoff on 26 Jun 2010 at 02:32 AM
Imagine if one of the rural villages on there last legs was given £5million to turn itself into an eco-village. Would that not be more sensible rather than creating new towns.
New Cumnock for instance.
Geoff
#6 Posted by Geoff on 27 Jun 2010 at 22:13 PM
CARBUNCLES 2009 versus Eco-Towns.
Where should the money be spent?
New Cumnock is one of the Gateways to Ayrshire and with first impressions being the most important why are things getting worse instead of better?
The community of this Carbuncle runner-down thought that politicians were going to try and improve the town after Prospect told the truth about how they have been let down.
How wrong we've been.
SAndals
#7 Posted by SAndals on 29 Jun 2010 at 17:15 PM
Is that the best image we have?
A gloomy vision of PVs, wheelie bins and some stripey deck chairs.....I'm in - where do I sign?

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